top of page
0-DendrofemonologySculpture.jpg

Watch our new seven minute film which explores the creative process and the ideas behind the sculpture and moveable monument, Dendrofemonology: A Feminist History Tree Ring. It also serves as an invitation to mobilize for women's rights and the planet on Sept 21st in NYC, and a call to action to vote on November 5th, 2024. 

DENDROFEMONOLOGY

A FEMINIST HISTORY TREE RING

“I have always been fascinated by the tree ring timelines at the entrance of Muir Woods or any National Park. They illuminate how the trees are a witness to human history. However, I also felt like those timelines tell a colonialist and patriarchal story. The tree rings in Human Nature imagine what alternate histories could be told…starting with a feminist history tree ring." - Tiffany Shlain
 

On Nov 1-4, 2023 DENDROFEMONOLOGY: A Feminist History Tree Ring, was installed on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Dendrofemonology tells a 50,000 year history of humanity through an intersectional feminist lens, to inspire as many people as possible to #ReclaimOurHistory and #VoteOurFuture.

​

Temporary monument brings a feminist timeline of history to Washington, DC’s National Mall

- The Art Newspaper

​

At the National Mall, Artist Tiffany Shlain Is Rewriting Women into U.S. History â€‹Ms Magazine

​

Feminist Tree Ring is a Moveable Monument Which Has Become a Visual Locus for Galvanizing Collective Action in Feminist Interventions- White Hot Magazine

​

Feminist Tree Ring Stands Tall on the National Mall- Print Magazine

​

Dendrofemonology A Feminist History Tree Ring on the National Mall- Surface Magazine

TsinDC.jpeg

DENDROFEMONOLOGY: A Feminist History Tree Ring debuted as part of Tiffany Shlain's Human Nature exhibition in The San Francisco Ferry Building's Shack15 in November 2022. The Human Nature exhibition was presented by the National Women's History Museum and Women Connect4Good.

 

After the installation on the National Mall in Washington DC Nov 1-4, 2023, DENDROFEMONOLOGY will travel to New York City, where it will be at Nancy Hoffman Gallery in Chelsea as part of a solo exhibition of HUMAN NATURE,  Sept 5, 2024.

​

A large-scale photograph of DENDROFEMONOLOGY was featured at the de Young museum de Young Open Sept 2023 to Jan 2024. Highlights at the bottom of the page.

​

Text Burned onto Tree Ring
from center r
ing out:

 

  • 50,000 BCE Goddesses are worshiped. 

  • 10,000-3000 BCE Women are healers, shamans, and warriors. A number of societies acknowledge multiple genders.

  • 3100 BCE Literacy develops, and seeds of patriarchy spread.

  • 2400 BCE Mesopotamian law declares: “If a woman speaks to a man out of turn, her teeth will be smashed in by a burnt brick.” 

  • 200 BCE Goddess worship is forbidden in Judaism, and later, in Islam and Christianity.

  • 690  Wu Zetian becomes the first—and only—female ruler of China.  

  • 1100 Matrilineal and matriarchal Hopi tribe establishes the community of Oraibi in present-day Arizona.

  • 1450 to 1918 50,000 women tortured and executed as witches across Europe and America.

  • 1576-1610 Queen Amina rules over Zazzau (present-day Nigeria).

  • 1690s Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz becomes the first published feminist in the Americas.

  • 1776-1860s Abortion up to four months of pregnancy is legal in the United States.

  • 1880s Inspired by indigenous and abolitionist leaders and British suffragists, first-wave feminism gains momentum in the United States.

  • 1920 19th Amendment grants US women the right to vote, although most women of color are disenfranchised until the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

  • 1920 The Soviet Union legalizes abortion.

  • 1960 FDA approves birth control pill in the United States

  • 1960 Sirimavo Bandaranaike of Ceylon (present-day Sri Lanka) becomes the first woman to be elected to lead a democratic country.

  • 1962 Dolores Huerta co-founds US National Farm Workers' Association.

  • 1960s Second-wave feminism begins with leaders including Dorothy Pitman Hughes, Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, Flo Kennedy, and Shirley Chisholm.

  • 1963 First woman in space Valentina Tereshkova flies a solo mission and orbits Earth 48 times.

  • 1972 Title IX prohibits gender-based discrimination in US federally-funded educational programs and activities.

  • 1972 The US Senate approves addition of the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution. (The states have not yet ratified it.)

  • 1973 Roe vs. Wade legalizes abortion in all US states and territories.

  • 1974-1980 The Combahee River Women’s Collective calls out the interconnectedness of sexism, racism, and homophobia, and demands change in mainstream feminism and civil rights movement.

  • 1975 Icelandic Women’s Strike held to protest inequality in the workplace and the home. 90% of women participate, and 15 years later Iceland elects a woman president.

  • 1989 Kimberlé Crenshaw defines the concept of intersectionality and ushers in third-wave feminism.

  • 1993 Women allowed to wear pants on the floor of the US Senate.

  • 2006 Tarana Burke begins #MeToo movement.

  • 2016 Hillary Rodham Clinton receives the majority of votes in the US presidential election.

  • 2017 An estimated 5 million people attend Women’s Marches globally. #MeToo goes viral.

  • 2017 Oregon becomes first state to include non-binary gender category on IDs.

  • 2020-2022 US elects first female Vice President Kamala Harris and first trans State Senator, Sarah McBride; Ketanji Brown Jackson becomes first Black woman confirmed to  Supreme Court.

  • 2022 

    • Roe v. Wade is overturned, eviscerating federal protection of reproductive rights in the U.S.

    • Globally, 65 countries have legalized abortions, four in the last year.

    • Globally, 86 women have been elected president or prime minister to date…

  • Today:

​

IMG_3120.jpeg
TiffanyBurningDendrofemonology.jpg
Honored by Newsweek as one of the "Women Shaping the 21st Century," Tiffany Shlain is an artist, activist, Emmy-nominated filmmaker, national bestselling author, and the founder of the Webby Awards. Working across mediums, from sculptures, films, to performance, Shlain's work explores the intersection of feminism, philosophy, technology, neuroscience, and nature. The Museum of Modern Art in New York premiered her one-woman spoken cinema show, Dear Human, and her recent art exhibition, Human Nature, was presented by the National Women’s History Museum. The centerpiece sculpture from that show, DENDROFEMONOLOGY, A Feminist History Tree Ring, was installed on the National Mall in DC Nov 1-4 and a large-scale photograph of the work was part of the de Young OPEN at the de Young Museum of Fine Arts. The Nancy Hoffman Gallery in New York will be presenting her solo exhibition Human Nature Sept 5th, 2024. Shlain is also creating an exhibition with Ken Goldberg for the Getty Museum's Pacific Standard Time: Art & Science Collide art initiative titled Ancient Wisdom for A Future Ecology: Trees, Time & Technology at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles set for Oct 17, 2024. Her awards and distinctions include selection by the Albert Einstein Foundation for their Genius100 list, the Neil Postman Award for Career Achievement in Intellectual Activity, and inclusion in NPR’s list of best commencement speeches. Shlain is known for her dynamic cinematic talk experiences and performs internationally. Her films have had multiple premieres at the Sundance Film Festival, received over 60 awards, and have been shown at US embassies around the world to represent America. Shlain’s book, 24/6: Giving up Screens One Day a Week to Get More Time, Creativity, and Connection, received the Marshall McLuhan Outstanding Book Award. Shlain is represented by Nancy Hoffman Gallery. @tiffanyshlain
bottom of page